"If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at Maria Borelius"

In a way Man hasn't changed very much the last 2000 years.

The new Swedish government has its first minister resignation after only a week in power.The minister is a woman named Maria Borelius, she was meant to be the Trade Minister but now she has been "stoned" out in the cold by media and bloggers.

The last week a lot of academic discussions have been going on about moral, civil disobedience, upper class arrogance etc. This is because Maria Borelius during different occasions in her life has ran away from paying tax.
Once she employed a nanny without paying employer's tax. She didn't pay her Television licence and she owns a house via a company based in the tax escaper’s paradise Jersey.

Maria Borelius lied about the reasons why she hired the nanny illegally. She claimed she and her husband couldn't afford to pay employer's tax. But nobody believed that, this was nothing but a lousy, lousy lie. Maria Borelius and her husband had at the time of the offence, a common income sky high above the average Swede.
Maybe this lie was Maria’s biggest mistake. To be honest, who doesn't want to escape tax? But lying to the people is really bad.

So, stoned she was.

Sweden’s new Prime minister; Fredrik Reinfeldt, tried at first to be forgiving but the pressure got too strong and finally he had to advice Maria to resign.

So, what would Jesus have done if he was in Fredrik Reinfeldt's situation?

In the Bible, John 8: 1-11, we can read the famous words Jesus said to the crowd, wanting to stone a woman caught in adultery: "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

When the crowd had left, without throwing one single stone, Jesus told the woman: "Go now and leave your life of sin."

"Do not commit adultery" is the 7th of God's 10th commandments. If the woman had been caught during the time before Jesus, the time of the Old Testament, she would most likely have been stoned. She was very lucky to be brought before Jesus whose mission on earth, among others was to teach Man to be forgiving.

How about Maria Borelius:
8th Commandment: Do not steal.
9th Commandment: Do not lie.
If Maria had lived during the time of the Old Testament she may have had her hand chopped off for stealing and her tongue cut out for lying.

Luckily Maria lives in Sweden 2006. Sweden is a country with an interesting mix of Old Testament and New Testament Christian values.

This is why we first stone Maria with words and after that tell her to "Go now and leave your life of sin."

Finally the most difficult part; to repent and to forgive.

To be forgiven you have to repent. I haven’t read or heard any statement from Maria Borelius showing any kind of remorse. Her reason to resign was, according to media that the pressure on family and friends became to strong and the resignation was handed over to release that pressure.

Maria, I can’t forgive you if you can’t repent.
If you repent I will forgive you.